Re: national v nationalist

[DonKelley@aol.com]

I believe Joseph Ross is correct. Commonwealth is strictly semantic.  In Webster's, when you look up Commonwealth, definition #3 is "a state" as in one of the United States. When you look up State, definition #5a is "a commonwealth."

Note that the Capitol buiilding in Boston is known as the State House. Inside it we have State Senators and State Representatives. The blue and gray squad cars patrolling the Mass Pike and other highways are marked "State Police" and the officers inside them have a patch on their right sleeve that says State Trooper.  The speech delivered by the Governor each January is called State of the State, not State of the Commonwealth.   

Note also that four of the fifty states call themselves a Commonwealth - but so does Puerto Rico, which is not a state of the US, but does meet the Webster #5a definition of a state.